


dreams

by artificialromance



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, Grief/Mourning, at least the pentatonix version is to me idk, i'll be home for christmas is actually such a sad song
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-27
Updated: 2017-12-27
Packaged: 2019-02-22 10:44:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13165260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artificialromance/pseuds/artificialromance
Summary: Peace, rare then, became a myth now among notions of happily ever after and it gets better. Quiet, yes; suffocating, abundant. But never peaceful.





	dreams

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this about a year a month ago so it takes place sometime in the first third of season four lol  
> inspired by pentatonix's cover of "i'll be home for christmas"

Daisy can only often wonder how she had grown so close to such a stranger. She stares at a copy of the photograph of Lincoln on the wall of her van. She's there too, head facing the camera, eyes squeezed shut and smiling into his shoulder. His look garners surprise, but she remembers the sweetness in his voice from the moment. Elena's laugh after showing them the picture she stole stole.  
"You're so sneaky! And this is _not_ my angle," Daisy whines weakly in playful protest. She didn't mean any of it. The photo made her heart jump in the best way possible. She looked happy. So did he.  
"Stop it," Elena says, her lips pulling into a grin. "You two are adorable.”  
"I love this. Thank you, Elena," Lincoln says softly. "I'd wanna keep this forever."  
A snapshot of peace right before one of the toughest periods of her life. Before /this/ period of her life. Peace, rare then, became a myth now among notions of happily ever after and it gets better. Quiet, yes; suffocating, abundant. But never peaceful.  
Her thumb runs over the bottom corner of the original photo, contemplative, and she takes it off the wall and places it on top of a bunch of his belongings in a box. Clothes, mostly; shirts, socks, a tie, and a few others, more photos on top. Daisy picks up the lid to put it on, but hesitates. She finds a scrap piece of paper and picks up a pen. 

The next night she finds herself at the window of a suburban house. Not to break the lock on the window by quaking it open, she picks it manually, gives her hands something to do in case they shake and she misses. She thinks of his mother inside, Lucy, a great wife and a sweet mother from her research and his own words, and she wonders how they manage. The medical records she traced pointed his father an alcoholic. Was he violent? Daisy imagines Lincoln's life in this home as she peers through the window. She wants to imagine him safe. She shakes her head to get rid of anything else. The window clicks open and Daisy steps in, setting down a cardboard box by a small fake tree in a room with a fireplace and she doesn't dare look at the picture frames resting on the mantle in case she sees him behind the broken glass of each one. Images again, this time unsafe, undeserved, what she can make of his dad throwing things. She doesn’t realize she’s been stuck here, paused crouching down, one hand still on the box. Taking in a quiet deep breath, she lets the constructed memories of a life never hers slip away, and making her way out the window again, she's interrupted.  
"You know you didn't have to break in like this," Robbie says. "You could've left it at the doorstep. People leave babies there and they don't get stolen or anything."  
"You followed me," Daisy says, the words like metal in her mouth, objective and cold. She keeps walking to her car without looking behind her to face him.  
"I thought you were gonna do something stupid. Actually no, not stupid. Dangerous. This is only the first one.”  
“I don’t need protection.” _Your_ protection, she wants to stress.  
“I should've stayed in L.A. with Gabe. Not that he still believes in Santa anyw—"  
“Stop.”  
"Tell me what's wrong with you."  
"Since when did you care anyway?" It aches to even respond. She doesn't know what his intentions are and frankly doesn't have the energy or the patience to figure them out. Daisy can feel him approach her before she hears his footsteps and she can only storm back to her van, slam the door and speed away. She sees Robbie standing where he was in her mirror, looking defeated. She drives and drives, until she is sure he cannot find her again, at least not for long. She slows to a stop and lets her head fall and rest on the steering wheel. Lazily, she lifts her hand to turn on the radio. A smooth and androgynous voice cuts above the static. 

_"Christmas Eve will find me_  
_Where the love light gleams._  
_I'll be home for Christmas,_  
_If only in my—"_

The vibrations ringing through the air overpower the sound of the plastic and metal collapsing. Her hand’s splayed open and in front of it she sees her old car radio, destroyed beyond repair. 

—  
_Lincoln would want you to have this. ~~I'm~~ I was his girlfriend.  
Merry Christmas._


End file.
